Hedwig’s contractions were coming faster by the time they pulled into the nearly empty parking lot of the small grouping of adobe buildings that comprised Carrizozo Indian Hospital.
“Is this place even open?” Will asked, turning off the ignition.
“It’s supposed to be.” Taylor double-checked the directory on his phone. “Thirteen beds. Family practice. Inpatient and outpatient.”
“I need a real hospital,” groaned Hedwig.
“This is a real hospital.”
“You’re going to kill me and the baby both.”
“You couldn’t find anything else?” Will asked, uneasily watching the writhing in the backseat.
“This is the closest. She keeps saying she’s going to have this kid any second —”
“All right. Can you make sure they’re open before we try dragging her out of the car?”
Taylor got out of the car and went up the cement walk. The heat of the day was fading, but the walls of the building still radiated warmth. Wilted flowers struggled in the baked dirt of what was optimistically intended as landscaping. It did look sort of deserted, but there was a shiny new pickup in the parking lot, as well as a very old ambulance.
He pushed through the double glass doors, and a wave of antiseptic-scented, chilled air hit him.
A plump Indian boy of about seventeen stood behind a counter. His eyes widened at the sight of Taylor. And if Taylor looked half as rough as he felt, no wonder. It had been one hell of a long day.
“Are you open?” Taylor asked.
“Yes.” The kid seemed to collect himself. “If you want to sit down, I’ll bring you the paperwork.”
“It’s not for me. I’ve got a woman in the parking lot who’s about to give birth. Do you have a doctor on the premises?”
“My mom — that is, Dr. Cruz is over at Happy Pete’s having her evening break. I can page her.”
Taylor sincerely hoped Happy Pete’s was not a bar. “Could you? That would be great.”
“Sure, I’ll —”
Whatever else the kid was about to say was lost in the jarring sounds of skidding tires, blasting horns, and breaking glass from outside. The unmistakable accompaniment of a car crash.
“It’s an accident!” the kid exclaimed, coming around the counter. “It happens all the time on this corner.” He ran out through the glass doors.
“Are you kidding me?” Taylor asked the empty room.
Apparently the joke was on him. He shoved open the glass doors, narrowly missing being mown down by the kid, who was already racing back, looking stricken.
“There’s a guy with a gun out there!” He ran to the phone on the desk.
Taylor banged out through the entrance. He drew his weapon, keeping his pistol at low ready as he jogged down the cement walk.
“But the baby is coming. I can’t walk.”
“You can walk, milaya moyna. I guarantee you will find the strength. Or perhaps you wish to watch me blow a hole through the chest of this agent?”
“No, I don’t want that, but —”
“I do not negotiate. Come.”
“Don’t get out of that car,” Will ordered thickly. “Keep the doors locked.”
Taylor leaned against the grainy bricks and poked his head around the rounded corner of the building. Nemov stood by their vehicle. He had one arm wrapped around Will’s throat. He held a new shotgun in the other. It was pointed at Will’s head.
“There you are, little man,” he said, spotting Taylor. “I thought you would be here faster. Come out where I can see you.”
Taylor leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes in brief prayer. He brought his weapon up and stepped out in firing stance.
“Federal agent. Drop your weapon.”
Nemov seemed taken aback. He laughed. “Do you not see I have your partner?”
Taylor’s eyes met Will’s. Blood was running down Will’s face from a cut in his hairline, but he seemed otherwise okay. Taylor flicked a quick look at their vehicle. Nemov had charged his reinforced SUV into their rental, crunching its nose into the tall brown trash Dumpsters.
Will had either gone for Nemov or been stunned just long enough for the bounty hunter to drag him out of the car. Either way, Hedwig had had the sense to lock herself in. The windows that weren’t broken were firmly sealed.
“The sheriffs are on their way. Drop your weapon.”
“Do you not see we have the Mexican stand —”
Taylor fired.
He had to hit Nemov at exactly the right place in the shoulder in order to paralyze his arm, and that meant grazing Will as well. He didn’t want to, but he couldn’t take the chance of an involuntary reflex of Nemov’s fingers on that trigger. If Taylor’d stopped to weigh all the possibilities, he might not have made the shot as cleanly as he did going simply by instinct. As it was, Nemov howled his pained outrage and dropped the shotgun, which hit the asphalt and exploded, taking out the tire of their SUV.
Will stumbled free and kicked the shotgun farther away. He clamped a hand to his bloody shoulder.
“You shot me!” He was staring at Taylor in utter disbelief.
“I know. Sorry.” Taylor brushed past him, slamming Nemov over the hood of the SUV. “I need your handcuffs.”
Will groped one-handed, found his cuffs, and tossed them at Taylor. “You fucking shot me, MacAllister.”
“I know, Will. I’m very sorry.” He adjusted the cuffs for Nemov’s massive wrists, clamped them on, and knocked him to his knees.
“I am injured,” roared Nemov. “I am bleeding.”
“You, I did mean to shoot, so just be grateful we’re at a hospital.”
Taylor stood as a white and gray cop car turned into the lot, lights flashing, siren screaming. It was followed by a second car with the sheriff’s insignia.
The SUV door swung open. Hedwig stepped out, clutching her belly, and tottered slowly toward the walkway.
“Where are you going?” Taylor called.
“To have my baby!”
The sheriffs piled out of their cars as still another police vehicle screeched into the lot.
“This is just great,” Will said.
“Hands up! Throw down your weapon!” The officer using the bullhorn wore a white cowboy hat. Clearly one of the good guys.
Taylor nodded, stooped to lay his pistol on the blacktop. He rose and locked his hands behind his head.
The sheriffs rushed forward.
* * * * *
“I still can’t believe you shot me.”
“I know. I’m sorry. It is just a flesh wound. The crack on your head needed more stitches.”
“That doesn’t exactly make it better.” Will was scowling, although he permitted Taylor to hold his hand as he perched on the edge of Will’s hospital bed. Will looked rakishly handsome with the white square of bandage on his forehead and the dark five o’clock — make that eight o’clock — shadow on his jaw.
Taylor lifted Will’s hand in both of his and kissed it.
“It hurts like hell.”
Taylor nuzzled Will’s knuckles. He kissed each finger with a tiny, sucking kiss.
“Hmmph.” Slightly mollified, Will said, “The baby’s okay?”
“Small but healthy. Six pounds, nine ounces. William Taylor Hedwig.”
“Christ.”
Taylor laughed.
“And what did Cooper have to say?”
“Ah. Apparently Hedwig — Kelila — was telling the truth. She was working voluntarily with the DEA.”
“What happened?”
“She uncovered a connection between Bashnakov and a DEA deputy administrator.”
“Ted Bell.”
“Yeah.” Taylor was surprised. “How did you know that?”
“Kelila and I had a chat earlier.”
Taylor raised his brows. “Well, around the time her contact at the DEA suffered a mysterious and fatal accident, Kelila realized she was pregnant. She decided to get out while she could. She got in touch with one of our people working in liaison with the DEA, and he put her in contact with Henry Torres. The DS was going to take on the internal investigation of the DEA, but then Torres was killed and Kelila was framed for his murder.”
“So…?”
“So it turns out our new AFOD was working from Torres’ notes and files to try and nail Ted Bell, which is why we were sent to retrieve Kelila. Cooper needs her as a witness. His case rests on her.”
Will’s face stilled. “Oh.”
Taylor grimaced. “Of course he couldn’t tell us that because there was obviously a leak somewhere.”
“What happens to Kelila now?”
“After Cooper’s got what he needs, she and the kid go into the Witness Protection Program.”
“And what happens to us for going off the reservation?”
“We got her back safely; that’s the main thing. Cooper’s flying out tonight to get her deposition.”
Will’s blue eyes watched him closely. “Good. What aren’t you telling me?”
“Nothing. Everything’s good.” Taylor took a deep breath. “You have to make your mind up about the Paris assignment. They…need an answer. Cooper’s going to ask for your decision when he gets here.”
Will’s eyes closed then. His hand tightened on Taylor’s fingers, bruising them.
“It’s okay. I already know.” Taylor said it so calmly, he almost believed it himself.
When Will opened his eyes, they were wet. “I…”
“You don’t have to say anything.” That much was the truth. He couldn’t handle seeing Will tear himself up over this. “We’ll be okay. It’s like you said. Time flies when you’re having fun.”
Will pulled him forward, wrestling him into a kind of bear hug where they could hang on tight and neither had to see the other’s expression. Taylor rested his face in the bare, warm curve of Will’s uninjured shoulder and listened to the shuddery sounds of Will fighting his feelings. He could hear the slow, heavy pound of Will’s heart, and though he was not much for poetry, he suddenly remembered lines from some forgotten time and place — all his times and places having led, it seemed, to this moment.
The bleeding to death of time in slow heart beats,
Wakeful they lie.